The Vacationers

“This is Joan, he’s going to be your Spanish tutor,” Fra

“Hi,” Sylvia said. Joan’s grip was a little bit soft, which made it easier to keep breathing. She might have died if he had a handshake as good as his hair.

“Very nice to meet you,” Joan said back. There was no wink, no acknowledgment of the run-in at the bathroom door. Sylvia slid into the chair next to her mother without taking her eyes off him, just in case he did make a gesture that indicated he had seen parts of her body that he shouldn’t have.

Fra

“Mom?”

“Sorry, sweetie. Did you say something?”

“We’re going to start tomorrow at eleven. Is that okay?”

“Perfecto!” Fra

They all stood up to walk Joan to the door, and Fra

“Wasn’t he gorgeous?”

Sylvia shrugged. “I guess. I don’t know. I didn’t really notice.” She spun on her heels and ran up the stairs to her bedroom, shutting the door with a loud clunk. As Fra

Everyone agreed that an early di

Fra

The setting sun had shifted over the mountain, and now Jim and Sylvia swam through the shade on their laps back and forth in the swimming pool. From Gallant’s current issue: “Why Doing Laps Will Make You Live to 100,” written by a novelist with a weak breaststroke and a spare tire, a piece Jim had commissioned because he thought it sounded like something Fra

“It’s not bad, huh?”

Sylvia swam over to the far lip of the pool and hoisted herself up on her elbows.

“It’ll do.” She wiped the water out of her eyes. “What time do Bobby and whatsherface get here? And Charles?”

“In the morning, like we did. They’ll be here early.” If they’d been in New York, standing on opposite sides of 75th Street, they wouldn’t have been able to hear each other: the cars, the people, the airplanes, the bikes, the noise of everyday life in the city. They hadn’t been talking as much as usual, anyway, not lately. Now they were twenty feet apart and could hear each other perfectly. If they’d shouted, their voices would have bounced off the trees lining the mountain and echoed into the valley below, into Pigpen proper, maybe all the way to the ocean.

“I wish he was coming by himself,” Sylvia said.